WiMAX backers positioning 802.16e as an alternative to municipal WiFi

At this week's WiMAX World show in Chicago, some of the buzz on the show floor …

As one might expect, there was some serious WiMAX boosterism evident at this week's WiMAX World show in Chicago. Somewhat less expected was a fair bit of trash-talking about municipal WiFi from supporters of WiMAX who believe that 802.16e, better known as Mobile WiMAX, has the potential to provide the kind of user experience and business case that municipal WiFi lacks.

Indeed, the recent news from the WiFi camp has been largely negative. After all of the hype surrounding the announcements of the first municipal WiFi networks a couple of years ago, setbacks during the last couple of months have illustrated the difficulties that vendors like Earthlink and city governments are having in finding a mutually-workable business model.

Late in August, Chicago decided to abandon its plans to deploy a citywide WiFi network. The vendors the city was negotiating with didn't like economics of the proposed deals, especially with the city unwilling to commit to using the service itself. Proposed municipal networks in San Francisco and Houston are also on the ropes.

When opportunity knocks...

Unsurprisingly, companies with a heavy investment in WiMAX believe that the high-speed wireless technology is a better alternative. "There's no business case for municipal WiFi," one executive told Ars. "WiMAX will have the bandwidth and the infrastructure to do what WiFi networks cannot."

Where municipal WiFi backers see problems, WiMAX adherents see opportunity. At WiMAX World, major WiMAX player Nortel announced a new WiMAX deployment for the Pine and Choctaw Electric Cooperative in Oklahoma. The new network will do everything that a municipal WiFi network could do: offer free broadband for public schools and municipal offices, paid access for homes and businesses, and carry VoIP traffic—all over 2.5GHz spectrum licensed to Pine. "It's a cost-effective way of increasing their data footprint," Nortel director of mobility access product marketing Daniel Locklear told Ars.

For the kind of pervasive coverage envisioned by citywide WiFi networks, it can be argued that WiMAX is a better choice from a technical standpoint. One of the complaints about municipal WiFi networks is spotty coverage indoors, a problem that shouldn't be nearly as severe with WiMAX's licensed spectrum—especially with WiMAX-802.11b/g/n routers and femtocells arriving on the scene. Also, since WiFi operates in unlicensed spectrum, there's always the matter of interference to deal with. In contrast, Sprint and Clearwire will have all of that 2.5GHz spectrum to themselves in the areas they cover—they'll just have to make sure they have enough towers and antennas to blanket the coverage areas.

WiMAX has its own set of challenges

The biggest problem for the "WiMAX is a superior alternative to municipal WiFi" argument is the lack of hardware support. Currently, every laptop sold has built-in support for 802.11b/g (with universal 802.11n support not far behind). That won't be the case with WiMAX for some time. Montevina, the successor to Intel's Santa Rosa platform, will make an appearance during the first half of 2008. But if you're not in the market for a new WiMAX-ready laptop, you'll be able to choose from any number of PCMCIA and ExpressCard solutions as well as USB dongles.

During Intel's keynote at WiMAX World yesterday, Intel executive VP Sean Maloney outlined his company's vision for the technology: $30 devices with $30 service. With Sprint deciding against subsidizing hardware, it will be up to manufacturers to price USB dongles and ExpressCards attractive enough to get the public to bite.

More important is how Sprint chooses to price the network. The company has yet to go public with its pricing scheme, but a Sprint spokesperson told Ars that Xohm would be priced "competitively" with cable and DSL, with service tiers based on speed. If Sprint can hit Intel's $30 price point, WiMAX could quickly become an attractive alternative for those looking to have the same broadband service at home and around town. Price it too high—and the temptation to do so has to be there given Sprint's $5 billion-plus investment—and most consumers will take a pass.

With many municipal WiFi deployments in a holding pattern, it may be Sprint's Xohm WiMAX network will be up and running before muni WiFi can get its act together. From what I saw during my Motorola-sponsored cruise on the Chicago River earlier this week, WiMAX has the potential to deliver the goods in terms of speed, latency, and reliability. If Sprint hits its goal of blanketing metropolitan areas with WiMAX in a timely fashion and prices the service attractively, the kind of expansive municipal WiFi networks once envisioned in Chicago, Houston, and San Francisco could go the way of Pets.com and Flooz.